Effective maintenance of a firearm begins with an effective and regularly scheduled way to schedule and perform routine maintenance on the firearm. In the past, maintenance was performed when an individual component failed, or began to fail. At that point, the firearm would generally be rebuilt, repairing or replacing all components of the firearm subjected to wear and tear during usage.
In recent years, preventive maintenance systems have been used to anticipate failure of the firearm, or of individual components, and to implement maintenance procedures to repair or replace components of the firearm before they fail. Such preventive maintenance systems have been implemented in two different methods. In one method the age of a weapon is tracked and preventive maintenance steps taken therein at a certain chronological time on a calendar, i.e. once per year, once every six months, etc. Alternatively, another method is to track how many times the firearm is operated and to then implement preventive maintenance procedures at a point of usage before components of the firearm begin to fail.
Both the calendar based preventive maintenance method and usage based preventive maintenance method have drawbacks. First, both generally result in complete overhauls of the firearm when the maintenance is performed, even though some components have longer useful lives than others and do not need to be repaired or replaced. It would be preferable to track the usage of individual components on the firearm and only perform maintenance repairing or replacing a component at the end of its useful life.
In addition, calendar based preventive maintenance systems result in unnecessary maintenance being performed on little used firearms while missing necessary maintenance on heavily used firearms. It is thus preferable to utilize usage based preventive maintenance procedures because it avoids the wasteful maintenance of little used firearms, as well as reducing the catastrophic failure that result from a lack of maintenance of heavily used firearms. Usage based preventive maintenance systems, however, require effective tracking of usage, generally accomplished through the use of some form of shot counter device to quantify the number of times the firearm is discharged, and the means for displaying or interpreting the data generated by the shot counter device.
A preventive maintenance system for a firearm that is dependent on tracking the usage of the firearm is costly because it necessitates the addition and use of a shot counter. In addition, such preventive maintenance systems are also costly because the maintenance that is performed, based upon usage, is generally a complete overhaul, repair or replacement, of all of the components of the firearm prone to wear and tear. The individual components are not monitored or tracked, so components with relatively long useful lives are unnecessarily repaired or replaced, an inefficiency even in the usage based preventive maintenance system.
The importance of an effective and efficient preventive maintenance system for maintaining firearms cannot be overstated, particularly for large entities such as police departments or military units wherein life and death depend on the reliable operation of firearms. While it is most important to such entities, it is also most difficult to implement a preventive maintenance system for such a large group of weapons because a large amount of data (shot counting for each firearm) must be accurately maintained. A preventive maintenance system for large scale firearms maintenance, such as police and military entities, must be effective and efficient and regularly implemented. If not diligently implemented, the reliability of all firearms is suspect and the system fails.
The tracking of a weapon, and the maintenance history of the weapon, becomes an enormous and time consuming task when large numbers of weapons are involved. Tracking all of the maintenance steps performed on a weapon and attaching it to the weapon's serial number is complex when weapons are put into service in one location, taken out of service and sent somewhere else for maintenance, repaired, and put back into service in another location. The logistics and data entry requirements are only made more complex when this process is repeated. Any errors in data entry, such as in weapon or shot counter serial number, maintenance history, etc., will compromise the whole system and will probably only be identified if the weapon fails, a potentially catastrophic occurrence. It would be advantageous to provide a preventive maintenance system wherein the entire history of a weapon, including the number of times its been fired, when and how it or its components have been repaired or replaced, is in a database stored on the weapon itself and accessible through a portable data acquisition tool. Such a system allows on site maintenance of the weapon, eliminates the need to correspond everything to the weapon serial number, eliminates the need to maintain a weapon maintenance database, and eliminates errors in transferring data when the weapon is put into or taken out of service.
For the preferred usage based preventive maintenance system, the first obstacle is to provide a reliable device and method for counting how many shots are fired. One major consideration when providing a device for counting shots is how the shot counter is powered and what kind of life the power supply has. For a shot counter mounted on a weapon, it is important that the power supply for the shot counter be small and light and that it have a long life. Failure of the power supply results in a failure of the shot counter and, effectively, a failure of the entire preventive maintenance system. Any power supply that itself requires maintenance, such as changing or charging of a battery, will be a significant drawback because the entire preventive maintenance depends on it.
The life of the power supply battery, and the shot counter, is defined by both the capacity of the battery and the current draw of the shot counter circuit. That is, the life of the battery can be extended by either making the battery larger, or making the system power requirements smaller. If an electrical circuit is designed for the shot counter that uses very little power, the life of the battery, and indeed of the shot counter, is greatly extended.
As set forth in more detail herein, the countervailing design considerations of long life but small size are accommodated with the present invention by using a Lithium battery and a shot counter circuit that draws no power until either a mechanical counter device “wakes” it up to count or it receives a wakeup signal to communicate. The shot counter device of the present invention utilizes an inertia switch, a mechanical on/off switch that is sensitive and closes only when the firearm is fired. The inertia switch is designed and specified so that it can distinguish between a drop, shake or crash of the firearm and a shot because it includes a spring loading specifically designed for the weapon's characteristics to close only upon detection of a shot, and to close only once for each shot, i.e. the spring is defined with a constant that prevents “bouncing” of the counter. Providing a lithium battery powered circuit, which only draws current momentarily when a shot is detected or when communicating, the life of the battery/shot counter eliminates the need to provide for replacing the battery.
The inertia switch provided is similar to that described in U.S. Pat. No. 5,566,486 to Brinkley which patent is assigned to Accu-Counter, just as the present application and invention disclosed herein is. By providing a shot counter assembly with a sufficiently long life without requiring battery replacement or any other maintenance, the shot counter device is permanently installed on the firearm assuming it will never have to be repaired or the battery replaced. Because there is no need to change batteries or otherwise maintain the shot counter device, this leads to the significant benefit that the entire shot counter device may be permanently enclosed in a housing that is impervious to moisture, temperature or other damaging environmental factors. It is a critical advantageous feature of the present invention that the firearm mounted shot counter device is permanently installed, sealed and encapsulated to protect it from harsh environmental factors of moisture and temperature, with a battery and counter circuit of sufficiently long life that the shot counter device will not need to be replaced. As set forth in more detail herein, the present invention accomplishes this with a Lithium battery and a counter circuit that only “wakes up” upon closure of an inertia switch when a shot is detected or when communicating. It is contemplated, however, that other long life shot counter devices that meet those criteria may be used without departing from the principles of the present invention, specifically that the shot counter device is permanently installed on a weapon in an environmentally impervious housing with the capacity to communicate data stored in the shot counter device without requiring an mechanical contact for such communication, as set forth in more detail below.
Preventive maintenance of a firearm based upon usage of the firearm requires a very accurate count so the integrity and reliability of the counter device is of utmost concern. If the shot counter device is inaccurate one time for one weapon, the integrity of all of the maintenance of all of the weapons is called into question and the preventive maintenance system fails.
A long life for the shot counter device is further necessary because one of the anticipated benefits of the use of the present firearm maintenance system is that the life of firearms maintained thereby will be extended. Specifically, the present system will make it effective to replace individual components of the firearm as they wear out, thereby extending the useful life of the firearm.
It is a very difficult task to track the usage of individual components of a firearm but when it is done accurately, as by the present invention described in more detail herein, it saves a great deal of expense and labor to replace components only when they reach the end of their useful lives instead of replacing all the components every time a calendar based or usage based system indicates it is time for maintenance of the firearm.
Prior art shot counters have included many methods and devices for making the data (i.e. number of shots fired) available to a user of the firearm. The '486 patent to Brinkley, for example, discloses the use of a digital display on the weapon. U.S. Pat. No. 7,143,644 to Johnson, on the other hand, alludes to the use of shot counter data by transferring it to a computer for analysis, but does not describe a method or system for such.
Providing a system wherein a firearm's usage history can be analyzed, to facilitate preventive maintenance on the firearm, is clearly desirable. Further, a usage based preventive maintenance system wherein separate components of a firearm can be tracked and maintained is desirable, particularly to large scale firearms owners such as military and police organizations.
In addition to the design constraints for the weapon mounted shot counter device, a usage based preventive maintenance system requires a reliable method and hardware and software to store the data, communicate the data to a drive to analyze the data, and update the data to reflect historical usage and maintenance. The present invention addresses and provides solutions for issues pertaining to the reliability of the data, where the data is stored and how it is communicated and how the data is analyzed and by whom or what device performs the analysis.
A preventive maintenance system for firearms using some of the principles of the present invention is in use by the U.S. Navy and known as the WEAR system. It is a usage based preventive maintenance system that uses an inertia switch and tracks weapon usage. Data is uploaded to a computer from a firearm mounted shot counter device for analysis, and then maintenance is performed as indicated by the analysis. The significant drawback of the WEAR system is that the data for all weapons is stored in a central database; the firearm mounted shot counters are simple devices that count shots and communicate that count for analysis, and they do not contemplate or provide for data to be communicated into the shot counter device that is mounted on the weapon. This creates the significant disadvantage that the WEAR system, to be effective, requires accessibility to the central database anytime and from anywhere to maintain the firearm. It is also disadvantageous because data entry errors in the serial number or inputting of data invariably occur. As set forth in more detail herein, the present invention moves the data storage onto the firearm itself, so that the entire shot count and maintenance history of a firearm will be stored on the firearm itself; there will be no need to access, or even retain, a centrally located maintenance file prior to performing maintenance thereon, and there will be no data entry errors in putting in the serial number. There is no need to track the firearm maintenance related to a serial number. The entire database is right there on the weapon.
The constraints and challenges to providing a reliable shot counter, with a related system that allows for storage and analysis of data, including firearm maintenance data, are significant. The present invention addresses all of the challenges including the new approach of storing all data pertaining to a firearm's shot count history and maintenance history on the firearm itself in durable, permanently installed memory. The prior art need to organize, maintain and protect data related to an identification number for each weapon on another device, such as a central computer, is eliminated.
As set forth in more detail herein, the firearm mounted shot counter device of the present invention is encapsulated and protected from the environment, including provisions for communicating data to and from the device without requiring any electrical connection. In the most preferred embodiment, the present invention utilizes infrared radiation (IR) communications, but other forms or wireless communications, including radio frequency (RF) and other forms, are contemplated and do not depart from the principles of the present invention. A long life Lithium battery is used in conjunction with a low power circuit that only draws power when it “wakes up” to count or while communicating, so the entire device including the battery may be encapsulated and permanently installed on a weapon without replacing the battery.
The firearm mounted shot counter device of the present invention, described in more detail herein, cooperates with a laptop computer having a weapon maintenance algorithm thereon to provide a durable and efficient system for firearm maintenance. Upon receiving data from the firearm mounted shot counter device, the data, obtained wirelessly through a data collection device, the laptop quickly analyzes the data and provides a report to the operator assessing the maintenance status of the firearm, including a component by component analysis, and recommendations to the operator as to which components need to be repaired or replaced. After performing the necessary maintenance on the components of the firearm, the operator updates the maintenance history of the firearm to reflect the steps he performed, i.e. he confirms to the laptop which components he repaired or replaced and when he did so, and that data is transferred back into the memory on the firearm itself, again wirelessly using IR communication.
Any laptop computer, loaded with the weapon maintenance algorithm of the present invention, may be used to analyze the status of any firearm equipped with the shot counter device described herein including the output and input communication devices. There is no longer a need to maintain data regarding a weapon's usage or maintenance history because it is resident on the weapon itself in a form that is understood and interpreted by a laptop programmed with the weapon maintenance software.
The firearm maintenance system described in more detail herein addresses the failings and drawbacks of the prior art to provide a reliable and efficient means and method for maintaining firearms that will extend the life of firearms while also eliminating expense and labor associated with database organization or associated with unnecessary repairs to components of the firearm.